Bill to Further Natural Gas Transportation Clears Committee

Kentucky legislators are discussing a fund to support the establishment of public compressed and liquid natural gas filling stations across the state.

The fund would be supported by a 1 cent tax on every gallon of liquid and compressed natural gas sold at a filling station.

The strategy is contained in legislation approved yesterday by the House Committee on Tourism Development and Energy. Pike County Representative Keith Hall is chair of the committee and sponsor of the bill.

“If we can capture that penny, and put it into a revolving door fund like the Kentucky Science Technology I think it will revolutionize Kentucky using their own gas, building out their own state, for jobs, economy, savings,” Hall said.

Hall envisions the penny-per-gallon assessment would support grants for building new public natural gas filling stations or retrofitting current stations. The Pike County lawmaker says it would take a few years to build up the natural gas filling station system.

"Under current mom and pop gas stations, Pilot or whatever, you put a separate filling tank there, like you’ve got a diesel tank now, you got a gasoline pump, then you’ll have an LNG-CNG pump, and I think it makes it a lot more attainable when the cost is 150 thousand instead of one point five million,” he said

According to Hall, $1.5 million is the estimated cost for building a new public compressed natural gas filling station. Hall is optimistic about passage this session.

Danville Representative Mike Harmon expressed some concern about previous state action to take money from the underground storage tank fund.

“I’ve had some concerns with it in the past,” Harmon said. “I had one of my constituents a few years ago basically go bankrupt because he was not receiving payments, because we as a body kept sweeping that account.”

The establishment of new natural gas filling stations or adding compressed natural gas pumps to existing service stations would occur over the next several years.